No, the law in California is that an employee must be paid all monies owed at the time of termination. Cite. (And I believe that’s our very own pinkfreud answering that question.)
I’ve seen many circumstances where someone wasn’t told of their termination until the final paycheck had been processed and was ready to hand to them.
This is the most cogent response to my comments I have yet seen. The real problem is that managers are given a very limited set of tools to deal with employees like Joan. Joan didn’t or couldn’t respond to the normal tools managers have for dealing with employees like Joan’s. Her tool set, wrt Joan would be something like: a wet noodle, a box of tissues, a Nerf paddle and a .38 revolver. My problem isn’t so much that Maureen was finally pushed to use the .38 revolver (firing) but that there isn’t some more humane solution to problem posed by employees like Joan than, well, using the revolver. If there WERE some more humane solution, I suspect it would be used more quickly, much to everyone’s relief.
I’m not sure what your point is here.
Just an echo of what I was hearing here.
From your own cite “If an employee quits
giving fewer than 72 hours notice, the employee must receive final
wages within 72 hours of quitting. An employee who quits giving more
than 72 hours notice is entitled to receive a final paycheck on the
last day of work.” Like I said in my example- they would be handing Joan’s check to her then & there. However, the requirement gives up to 72 hours depending on circumstances. YMMV, IANAL.
But, let’s not go on & on about how much Maureen was torn up about this difficult decision. “Any misgivings I had about terminating this person were allayed immediately…” “I had to force myself to stop thinking about it because it was making me grin.” And, I don’t blame Maureen for being happy to see the "psycho hosebeast’ go.
Nothing worse than an EC hijack of a pit-party… getting back to Joan, do you think you can use the e-mail address she left to solicit her side of the story?
I’m just not ready to let this thread go away…
I’m not sure why you’re switching to the case of quitting. We’re talking termination. Anyway.
I went back and re-read Maureen’s account, which doesn’t actually mention a final check. I’m sure (I hope) that was just an oversight, a little tiny detail in the larger story. But I’ll ask anyway – Maureen, did Joan get her final check at termination?
There is a more humane solution, and it was used at least three times. In this case the more humane solution was suspension without pay and (that’s a non-inclusive and) a performance plan. Unfortunately, Joan did not respond (or not enough) to the humane solution which necessitated her being removed from the company.
How do you get the impression that she didn’t do that? OK, maybe she didn’t have a final paycheck waiting for Joan, but Maureen wasn’t the one who caused a scene. She had Joan and Mike in a private office for a private meeting. She described the reasons for Joan’s termination and requested the return of company property. Joan threw a fit, not Maureen.
Joan is the one who ran around sniffling to her co-workers before collecting her belongings and being escorted to the door. If drama popped up, Joan made it, not Maureen. Sure, there was a department-wide sigh of relief when the door hit her on the ass on the way out, but Maureen didn’t cause that.
Have you ever had a crappy coworker who made everyone’s job harder? It’s a huge relief when they’re gone. I had the joy of becoming PHB-free in October. The mood in the office is 100% better since then, and we’re no longer getting complaints from clients, vendors, and tenants about our rude leasing agent.
Those sanctions you spoke of were the napkins, noodles, etc., I was referring to. Any normal person would realize as soon as they got a suspension without pay or a performance plan that it was time to either get your resume out in the field or start playing ball the manager’s way, or both. But Joan didn’t, or couldn’t. She was oblivious to the threat of firing that such sanctions represent.
In any society there are going to be square pegs who don’t fit in well. And just as a prison is a measure of a society’s humanity, how we deal with such people is another suich measure.
What I was thinking more of was some sort of well-funded, well-run organization that worked with such people to either get them able to work within the norms of the average workplace, or find some abnormal workplace they’d be well suited to. Doesn’t seem to me to be such a radical thing, but I know how you Dopers like your firings, home foreclosures and such.
I was browsing the pit and wondered how this thread got to five pages already. So I clicked and saw Evil Captor had added his input. To a “firing” thread. Mystery solved.
{{{Maureen}}}, and thanks for sharing your tales.
Others have already answered in a much similar way as I have, so I don’t feel it necessary to reply to most of your post, but for the purposes of clarification:
Yes, I am really enjoying the fact that Joan got fired, and couldn’t care less what hardships she has to go through. I really just honestly don’t care about her one bit except as to her entertainment value as a board topic.
Mmmm’kay?
That’s nice. Since it would be ludicrous to propose that every business be responsible for developing a “Department of Misfit Toys,” this would have to be the responsibility of society at large. Perhaps a supervised employment situation, where people with Axis II personality disorders could do piecework?
Don’t get me wrong. I do have a measure of sympathy for people with personality disorders, in the abstract, and in the context of trying to work with them in therapy. It is nevertheless foolish, particularly in the therapeutic context, to behave as if consequences for inappropriate behavior aren’t warranted or useful. Change doesn’t generally occur through the accomdation by others to the behavior in question.
Furthermore, a) we don’t know that Joan does have a personality disorder. Would you feel differently if she had no history that would excuse or mitigate inappropriate behavior, and was unimpared by any problems with cognitive functioning?
b) Unlike the cartoons, misfit toys don’t necessarily get along with one another. Were Joan sent to the Acme Hosebeast Supported Work Environment, she would still likely be throwing elbows and stabbing backs. It’s just that she might not be the best at it in her workplace anymore.
c) Would she be compelled by law to work at the special needs facility? I would wager you that many people with personaltiy disorders, particularly some specific personality disorders, would balk at engaging in something so beneath them. What would be done with those people who chose not to hang out with the Breakfast Club?
Band name!!!
Hentor, my sweet, you’re using logic again. You’re going to make Evil’s head explode, and we’ll have a big mess to clean up.
Department of Misfit Toys. Hee Hee Hee.
Evil Captor, I agree with you that it’s a tragedy for Joan: she may never again have a happy day. She may start to drink. Bad things may happen to her.
But good things are going to happen for Maureen now, and those good things are what’s being celebrated. Maureen’s work life has just become far less stressful–and why shouldn’t that be celebrated?
If she’d dealt with the Joan stress by having Joan bound and tortured, then we wouldn’t be celebrating: we’d be pointing out that her reaction was unjustified. But as you have admitted, her reaction WAS justified, so we may celebrate her happiness.
If Joan were a member of this board and came in here in tears because she just lost her job, then at worst you’d have some people saying cruel things to her (and I’d agree that that’d be bad). More likely, you’d have a bunch of people offering virtual hugs, commisseration, and well-wishes on finding a better job. Because in that case, we’d be dealing with how the firing affected Joan, not how it affected Maureen.
Maureen, if you’ve got Joan’s email, would you be willing to forward it to Evil Captor? Maybe I’m wrong, but it sounds to me as though he’d like to offer her a hand.
Daniel
That’s a strange statement to come from someone with a bondage fetish.
He does it for their own good. They need discipline in their lives.
Only in the sense that I now have a better grasp of you as a person.
Mmmmm’kay?
I think the problem we have with your argument, Evil Captor, is that you say “treating human beings badly doesn’t make me feel all good inside,” yet you seem to sympathize more with the person who has done all the mistreating in this situation.
Joan has been treating humans beings badly for years now, and while getting fired sucks, no matter what the situation, her repeated mistreatment of her undeserving co-workers has, in (dare I say) our eyes, rendered us indifferent at best to the consequences that have/will befall her.
Y’know, they have an organization like that for people with severe drinking problems, and it has worked quite well. It’s called the Salvation Army. You may well be on to something there. Maybe something non-religious along those lines for anyone who’s having trouble staying in a job. Would it BOTHER you if such an organization were to exist?
Yes, change occurs by laughing at the misfortunes of others. Of course.
Only in the sense that a different set of problems might mandate a different solution. It might be that Joan only needs to find another line of work that’s better suited to her. I dunno. You don’t, either.
I would wager you are right about it being difficult to help people with some personality disorders, but we’re not talking severe schizophrenia here. We’re talking milder stuff, prolly more amenable to socialization. Think about the Salvation Army thing.
'Course we could do a lot better by our severe schizos than tossing them into the streets, but that’s another debate.